Global Navigation Satellite Systems Engineering, Policy, and Design
Following in the footsteps of the recent update of the GPS SPS Performance Standard, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has issued a performance standard for the Wide Area Augmentation System (WAAS).
By Glen Gibbons
In fall of 2009, the U.S. Air Force will begin broadcasting a transitional civil navigation (CNAV) message on the GPS L2 civil signal (L2C) now being transmitted on the modernized Block IIR (IIR-M) satellites. Currently, L2C is being broadcast as a dataless sequence without modulation.
By Glen Gibbons
Two new GPS modules based on the award-winning u-blox 5 engine and the NEO form factor — the NEO5D and NEO5G — have been announced by the Thalwil, Switzerland–based company.
By Glen Gibbons
Combined GPS + Galileo constellation. Image source: Nottingham Scientific Ltd., UKRepresentatives of the United States and the European Community (EC) meeting October 23 in Washington, D.C., reaffirmed their commitment to the 2004 cooperation agreement on Galileo and GPS in the first plenary session convened under the agreement.
By Glen Gibbons
Christine Edwards and Peter Hall of Sci-Tech Systems, Ltd.A UK start-up company, Sci-Tech Systems Ltd., gathered three prizes in the 2008 European Satellite Navigation Competition — including the overall Galileo Master Award — with a tracking system designed to help rescue persons who have fallen overboard from ships at sea.
By Glen Gibbons
Elizabeth Rooney, SSTL, receives ESA award from Didier Faivre for the company’s work on GIOVE-ABritish small satellite manufacturer, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd (SSTL), has received an award from the European Space Agency (ESA) acknowledging the successful GIOVE A mission and the company’s contribution to the success of the Galileo program.
By Glen Gibbons
NOAA’s National Geodetic Survey (NGS) has recently added 43 GPS tracking sites into the Continuously Operating Reference Station (CORS) network overseen by the federal agency.
By Glen Gibbons
A new GPS Standard Positioning Service Performance Specification (SPS PS) — the first new version since 2001 — brings the level of expected GPS service closer to real-world expectations, although still with conservative margins.
By Glen Gibbons
Baseband Technologies, of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, has announced its GPS/PC Jr, a real-time software GPS receiver IP solution.
By Glen Gibbons
u-blox AG has selected the NavX-NCS, a multi-constellation and multi-frequency GNSS RF navigation constellation simulator from IFEN GmbH, as the Galileo reference for its receiver development and testing.
By Glen Gibbons
The 746th Test Squadron (746 TS) will conduct its sixth JAMFEST, an innovative GPS jamming exercise at White Sands Missile Range (WSMR), New Mexico, in mid-January, 2009 — a rescheduling of the event that had been planned to take place next month.
JAMFEST programs are aimed at providing low-cost, realistic, GPS jamming scenarios for testing GPS-based navigation systems, as well as training personnel in unique GPS denied environments.
By Glen Gibbons
NaviForum, China’s large GNSS industry event, has been postponed from this December until next year.
“Due to the big earthquake and Olympics game in China, the Chinese government decided to postpone the NaviForum to sometime next year,” NaviForum organizer Peter Zhou told Inside GNSS. Zhou is executive secretary of the conference’s organizing committee.
By Glen Gibbons
After a series of rescheduled launch dates, U.S. Air Force (USAF) officials have placed the final two GPS Block IIR-M satellites on “indefinite” status, pending the replacement of ordnance timers used in the Delta II launcher.
In a response to inquiries from Inside GNSS, spokespersons for the GPS Wing at the Space and Missile Systems Center, Los Angeles Air Force Base, and Launch and Range Space Wing said that “based on the parts production and qualification schedule, we project the GPS IIR launches will occur in Spring and Summer 2009.”
By Glen Gibbons
